Though I am unpaid for my online efforts I still try to
use the vacation time I would be due under the KCATA-ATU 1287 contract. That’s
how my year-end holiday break turned in to two weeks in 2010–use it or lose it.
While I did enjoy some seasonal cheer with friends I have to admit it turned in
to more of a busmen’s holiday than I anticipated--including responding to some
unexpected, hopeful initiatives not yet ready for prime time publicity. For now,
the WIR, along with the Daily Labor News Digest effective
Monday, January 3, returns to regular schedule.

Ill Wind WatchIf you live in North America, Europe, or Australia, the dominant mass
media news stories during our holiday break were weather. Monsoon like rains
drenched the long parched coastal areas of California producing flash floods and
landslides. Snow paralyzed not only much of Canada and the northern tier of the
lower 48--where they should have been better prepared--but Atlanta and the Big
Apple as well. Rare hard freezes in Florida as far south as the Keys threatened
the citrus and strawberry crops and sparked a mass migration of manatees
desperately looking for warmer waters. Even rarer were a number of deadly
tornadoes–usually confined to the spring–that developed in several states.

In Europe snow was the big story shutting down not only
the principal airports but also most train service and major highways. And
Australia–long suffering from drought and wild fires--got hit with a flood of
“biblical proportions,” inundating an area bigger than Texas.

In addition to the deaths and suffering of all
creatures great and small, there are other issues that justify these weather
incidents being lead stories. In many places cuts in public sector responders
contributed to turning what would once have been inconvenient disruptions in to
life threatening disasters. Deregulated airlines operating around hub
connections that are a house of cards in the best of times totally collapse if
so much as one major hub goes down for any length of time.

But more important than the response to this unusual
combination of meteorological events is the question of why is extreme weather
increasing in alarming scale and frequency? AFP’s Marlowe Hood writes,

“Counter-intuitive but true, say scientists: a string
of freezing European winters scattered over the last decade has been driven in
large part by global warming. The culprit, according to a new study, is the
Arctic's receding surface ice, which at current rates of decline could disappear
entirely during summer months by century's end....

“Rising temperatures in the Arctic -- increasing at two
to three times the global average -- have peeled back the region's floating ice
cover by 20 percent over the last three decades. This has allowed more of the
Sun's radiative force to be absorbed by dark-blue sea rather than bounced back
into space by reflective ice and snow, accelerating the warming process. More
critically for weather patterns, it has also created a massive source of heat
during the winter months...

“The result, according to a modeling study published
earlier this month in the Journal of Geophysical Research, is a strong
high-pressure system over the newly-exposed sea which brings cold polar air,
swirling counter-clockwise, into Europe.”

The same pattern hitting Europe is, of course, also
impacting the other great land mass adjoining the Arctic–North America.
Australia’s problems flow from similar effects of global warming on the opposite
pole.

No longer a hypothesis about the future to be viewed
with skepticism, climate change resulting from burning fossil fuels has
begun. One of the ways it is unfolding is extreme weather, such as we are
witnessing this winter. And, this is just prelude. By the time the robust lady
sings there will be no flowers left to send backstage.

You didn’t see that part of the story on PBS–much less
Fox, CNN, or NBC. But if you scan, as I do, the sources the Establishment
follows to keep informed–such as the New York Times, Guardian,
Der Spiegel, Wall Street Journal-- you can find well written reports
about the science and impact of climate change. It’s not that the ruling elite
doesn’t know about this crisis. They are just too heavily invested in the
destructive practices that led to it–and continue to drive it–to agree to the
solutions required to stop it.

Many had hopes that former Vice-President Al Gore might
help his class come to their senses. Gore’s book and film, An Inconvenient
Truth, did a good job in explaining the cause of global warming. The
movie won an Academy Award and Gore won a Nobel Prize. But while a masterful
presentation of the problem, this work was short on real fixes, mainly
pushing failed market solutions such as cap-and-trade and alternative fuels such
as corn-based ethanol.

Recently Gore admitted to a free lance journalist that
he pushed ethanol in his film even though he knew its use was actually
counterproductive. His acknowledged motive was quite simple: since he was
contemplating another run for President, the early Iowa caucuses would be
crucial–and in Iowa politics ethanol is king.

Ironically, I can report some positive development this
past week in the heart of king corn ethanol–Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Some young
people there were so impressed with their first contact with the Alliance for Class & Climate Justicethey set up an attractive local version
of the ACCJ website which can be viewed here.

Looking AheadIn 11:
What’s Hot?–What’s Not?
It’s a good thing we have more troops than the other side because the class war
will continue on a number of fronts:

Shooting War
Except when it can be exploited for a patriotic occasion, or to denounce
WikiLeaks, we don’t hear much war news these days. Now approaching its tenth
year, the war in Afghanistan has claimed the lives of an unknown number of
Afghans and Pakistanis--and 2284 coalition troops, 1445 of them American. The
majority of these casualties have happened on Obama’s watch. Tens of thousands
of GIs remain in harm’s way in unstable Iraq. Total war-related expenditures
last year added up to 1.3 trillion dollars–not so coincidently equaling the
total Federal deficit. We support the efforts of US Labor Against the War to keep this issue relevant in the labor movement
despite the distraction of the Great Recession. And we endorse the call by the
United National Antiwar Committee for bi-coastal Out Now! Demonstrationsin New York and San Francisco April 9.

Private Sector Bargaining
2010 saw relatively few national contract negotiations in the USA. This year:

* The IUE and UE national contracts will lead
multi-union
bargaining at General Electric.
* The ILA East CoastMaster Agreement.
* The UAW will be back at the table with Caterpillar and the Big Three
automakers.

Public Sector
Postal worker contract negotiations continued over the holiday breaks. In
addition, you could say just about all public workers–Federal, state, local,
school, transit–will be under fire, signed contracts or not. During our break
some good overviews of these attacks appeared by Dan La Botz,
Mark Brenner.
Howard Ryan,
and Dave Johnson.
Many will try to imitate President Obama’s freeze of Federal civilian worker
wages. Most are going after pensions. Some are aiming to eliminate public sector
collective bargaining altogether. Privatization–especially in education–is on
the rise.

Social Security/Medicare
The Establishment lies about the inability to support even the present meager
levels of the last remnants of New Deal/Great Society has already eroded
expectation of ever receiving these benefits. We can be sure of prompt follow-up
on Obama’s plan to gut these once sacred gains of past struggles. This is one
fight we cannot afford to lose.

Human Rights
In a recent excellent articleabout the treatment of foreign-born
workers–many of them union members--David Bacon writes,

“Homeland Secretary Janet
Napolitano announced that almost 400,000 people were deported last year, the
highest number in the country's history. But deportations are only part of the
story. Much less visible is the other arm of current immigration enforcement
policy -- the firing of workers. The justification is brutal -- if immigrant
workers can't work, and therefore can't eat, pay rent, or provide for their
families, they'll have no alternative but to leave the country.”

All indications are this inhumane
treatment of our immigrant sisters and brothers will continue, if not expand.

Obama’s Justice Department has also reissued Grand
Jury subpoenas to union and antiwar activists whose homes were raided by the FBI
last September. Despite this long fishing expedition no charges have been filed.
Those summoned have indicated so far they will not answer questions even if they
are granted “immunity” from crimes they did not commit. That could land them in
jail for “contempt.” Their defense has been endorsed by a number of unions and
peace groups and deserves support from all of us. You can find out more by going
here.

This is by no means an exhaustive
list. Not all of us can devote ourselves to all of these important battles. But
each of us can–and should–take up an issue as our project. Our masters will show
no mercy. No action figures will save the day. These are the struggles of our
class to be won or lost by us. Happy New Year.

Forum Planning Meeting
A meeting to plan promotion of the first of our new KC Labor Forum series will
take place at Tony Saper’s home, 2113 Erie, North Kansas City next Sunday,
January 9, Noon-2PM. We will also select the topic for the second Forum.
Preferring to eat corn rather than burn it in our cars, we will have a hot
casserole Polenta Milanese, a meatless dish served in two versions–with
cheese or vegan–prepared by Mary Erio.

The KC Labor Forum will take place on the second
Sunday of each month (beginning February 13)at the North Kansas City Community
Center. A PDF of the leaflet for the first Forum can be viewed here